Semiconductor valves of the kind mentioned in the introduction are previously well-known. The semiconductor elements may consist of thyristors or other controllable semiconductor elements, or of diodes. Such valves are used within electric power engineering in power transmission plants. An important field of use is as valves in converters in installations high voltage power transmission. Another field of use of the valves is as control and switching means in equipment for series- or parallel compensation in ac networks.
Installations of the kind referred to here often have very high operating voltages. The valve voltages often lie at one or a few hundred kV, and the operating voltages relative to ground may be in the interval 500-1000 kV. A result of this is that large insulation distances are required, and the valve and the equipment have large dimensions and require large space.
The above-mentioned disadvantages are especially prominent in the case of enclosed, gas-insulated valves designed for outdoor erection. From, for example, the International Patent Applications WO 93/17488 and WO 95/28030, such valves are known. Each valve (possibly half a valve or two series-connected half valves) is arranged in a separate enclosure. The valve is gas-insulated, and the housing in which the valve itself is arranged is filled with a suitable gas, for example air, nitrogen, or SF.sub.6 (sulphur hexafluoride).
Valves of the above-mentioned kind have considerable advantages. The enclosures with the semiconductor valves mounted therein may, in principle, be prepared completely at the factory, and the need of the large valve halls is completely eliminated. However, in case of valves for higher voltages, the completion of the valves at the factory entails relatively large transport dimensions. At the highest currently occurring voltages, the dimensions of the enclosures would be so large that they could not be accommodated within conventional loading-gauges and thus could not be transported at all. The large dimensions of the enclosures would also entail a relatively large need of ground area for erection of the valves, usually 12 or 24 valves, which are included in a single-pole and a two-pole HVDC converter station, respectively.